The One Ocean Science Congress (OOSC) was a United Nations Oceans Conference special event organized by French research bodies Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) and Institut français de recherche entièrement dédié à la connaissance de l’océan (IFREMER). It aimed at providing Heads of State, Governments, and broader society with scientific insights on the Ocean's health and future trajectory. Over 2,000 scientists took part, including four members of the Pentland Centre's People and the Ocean Knowledge and Action Hub: Professor Christina Hicks, Dr John Childs, Dr Celine Germond-Duret and Dr Cristina Ruamo Chamorro . This blog summarises their contributions to the event.

Professor Christina Hicks delivered a keynote speech on Diverse Food Systems Support Justice and Nutrition on 5^th June, 2025.

[Photo of Professor Hicks talking about her experience at UNOC3 at a Pentland Centre event later in June 2025. Photo: Jodie Bawden]

The speech outlined that food systems are under immense pressure to change. While malnutrition remains prevalent globally, current production and consumption practices are both increasingly impacted by climate change and a major contributor to carbon emissions.

Aquatic foods – i.e. foods from both sea and freshwater - are highly nutritious, in many cases affordable, and with a lower carbon footprint than land-based alternatives are taking an increasingly prominent role in this changing foodscape.

However, aquatic food systems are highly diverse and in many instances support communities that are at risk of marginalisation. Drawing on recent research, Christina examined the role aquatic foods have come to play in global discussions on food system transformations. She explored tensions that are emerging at the intersection of aquatic foods as one of the most traded food commodities globally and aquatic foods as supporting local cultures, livelihoods, and diets.

Finally, she presented strategies to support more sustainable and equitable access to the diverse benefits of aquatic food systems and identify resources to guide governance of this space.

Dr John Childs delivered a talk on Knowing the Deep Seabed: Towards a Just and Inclusive Cartography on 3^rd June, 2025

[Photo of two polar bear sculptures in the sea outside the UNOC3 venue in Nice. Photo: Celine Germond-Duret]

Dr Child's talk was part of the first conference session dedicated to thinking through deep sea mining, its environmental impacts and politics.

He spoke about deep sea mapping as a political process, and that it is not just a question of 'understanding' an 'unknown' environment. He argued that by visualising the world solely through the lens of oceanography, science overlooks alternative ways of understanding the seabed and continues their marginalisation from social thought and the policy process.

He called for deep seabed maps to better highlight and represent its multiple heritages, geographies and worldviews globally. To do this he firstly highlighted the need for environmental knowledge production of the deep seabed to be decolonised. Secondly, he showed how the inclusion of marginalised and/or indigenous perspectives can challenge the notion of ‘territory’ and, in doing so, shape discussions around national/global seabed governance.

The session was well attended and generated lots of feedback, leading to conversations with a journalist about some of the points he raised.

Dr Childs felt that the talk was a really worthwhile and valuable opportunity to engage with ocean scientists in a critical but productive way.

Dr Celine Germond-Duret delivered a talk on Co-creating a just and inclusive blue economy: an analysis of ocean justice in policy and legislation on 4^th June, 2025.

[Photo of panellists at UNOC3 session, Dr Celine Germond-Duret is third from left. Photo: Diana Payne]

This research is part of Dr Germond-Duret's Leverhulme Trust project “Ocean Justice and the Blue Economy” and was conducted with Dr Senia Febrica and Chris Sanderson. It aims at identifying if legislation and policy documents related to ocean and coastal developments take into account questions of social justice.

The academic literature, as well as policy and legal documents on the blue economy, almost non-existent a few years ago, is now burgeoning. However, it remains an ambiguous and contested concept, and further work is needed to address the place of environmental protection within the blue economy, the role of communities in this process, and the potential human and social costs of additional economic activities at sea. As research on the blue economy expands and as stakeholders further exploit coastal and marine resources, it is critical to deepen our understanding of how the blue economy can be just and fair.

Using corpus linguistics analysis, we analysed close to 5,000 legislation and policy documents about coastal and marine matters (representing a word count of over 48 million) to identify references to communities, justice, equity. We found out that community and issues of equity are present in a substantial number of documents. However, communities are framed as passive, and in need of state intervention to ‘train’, ‘develop’ and inform them, as opposed to a process of mutual learning.

Discussions of ‘justice’, and especially ‘injustice’ and ‘social justice’ are rare in this dataset. And where mentioned, they appear to link to aspirations, as opposed to clear action. The next steps of this research will involve a comparison between documents from the Global North and the Global South, to assess whether justice and equity are framed in a different ways across regions, references to any potential negative impacts of blue economy developments on local communities, and how traditional knowledge is treated in the corpus.

Dr Cristina Ruano Chamorro gave a talk on The impact of fishmeal and fish oil factories on food security in West Africa on the 5^th of June, 2025, based on a study co-authored by Prof Christina Hicks, Dr. Eva Maire and Dr. Mark Hamilton

[Photo of Dr Cristina Ruano Chamorro delivering her talk at UNOC3. Photo: Cristina Ruano Chamorro]

In recent years, West Africa has become a major global exporter of fishmeal and fish oil (FMFO), with increasing industrial demand for small pelagic fish intensifying overfishing, threatening ecosystem sustainability, and undermining food security.

Small pelagic fish, such as sardinella, are highly productive and affordable sources of protein and essential nutrients (e.g., calcium, iron, zinc and omega-3 fatty acids), playing a crucial role in the food security of local communities in the region.

FMFO factories established in Senegal, The Gambia and Mauritania now compete with local communities for small pelagic fish. However, there is still a lack of large-scale studies examining the impact of the FMFO industry on the ground.

The study the talk was about, used secondary data from the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) of Mauritania, Senegal and The Gambia, as well as the Living Standards Measurement Study (LSMS) of Senegal, to examine the impact of the FMFO industry on food security in the region.

We provided a comprehensive analysis of the context in which the FMFO factories are operating in West Africa (i.e., what is the contribution of fish to food security in the region and who can access fish); and we also examined the impact of operational FMFO factories on household fish consumption.

The findings of the study highlight the importance of fish, particularly fresh sardinella, in supporting food security, especially for vulnerable groups such as young children and low-income households. We found that 80% of children aged 6–23 months did not meet the minimum dietary diversity (MDD) recommended by the World Health Organization, which requires consuming at least 5 out of 8 food groups daily. Among those who met MDD, most had consumed fish.

In addition, LSMS data from Senegal revealed that 80% of households consumed fresh sardinella, making it the most commonly consumed fish among the poorest households. We also found that access to fish is shaped by both socioeconomic and geographic factors. In particular, household wealth, employment status, and proximity to the ocean were positively associated with households' and children's fish consumption.

Finally, the study found that proximity to FMFO factories influenced fish consumption patterns, which varied by fish type and household wealth. Poorest households living near FMFO factories were 30% less likely to consume fish compared to those living 2–4 hours away. Specifically, they were 25% less likely to consume fresh sardinella, the species primarily used by the factories, than households living 2 hours away.

In contrast, consumption of other fresh fish (e.g., tilapia, barracuda, sea bream) increased with distance from the factories for the poorest households. Overall, the wealthiest households were generally less affected by proximity to FMFO factories.

Analysis shows that the impacts of FMFO factories on fish consumption are shaped by the interaction of geographic and socioeconomic factors. In a region where fish is critical for food security, these impacts disproportionately affect vulnerable groups and perpetuate existing socioeconomic inequalities.

Find out more about the Pentland Centre's People and the Ocean Knowledge and Action Hub.

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